(JTA) — The sale of clothes in a heavily Jewish neighborhood of London that are popular with neo-Nazis has spurred protests from a British watchdog on anti-Semitism.
The Thor Viking store opened recently in North Finchley yards away from the office of the chief rabbi of Britain, The Jewish Chronicle of London reported Thursday, and is selling the Thor Steinar brand that is favored by neo-Nazis in Europe and beyond.
“This shop is not welcome here and the sooner it moves on the better,” an unnamed spokesman for the Community Security Trust, or CST, told the Chronicle.
Ashley Rogoff, a trustee of the British Yad Vashem Holocaust commemoration foundation, told the chronicle that the opening of the new store — the first in London to offer the Thor Steinar brand — in the area was a “very worrying development.”
Residents have described the opening of the shop as “deliberately provocative” and fear it will attract racist thugs to the area, the Chronicle reported.
Ben Glickman, 43, of North Finchley, told the Chronicle, “It is disgraceful that this store has opened in a such a prominent Jewish area of London.”
The shop’s owner, Zsolt Mogyorodi, insisted he was not racist and only catering to Eastern Europeans living nearby who like the brand, the Chronicle reported.
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